Magic Runs Mouth About Isiah In New Book

Damn ‘Gic, tell me what I read in the Ian Thomsen (SI.com) article is not what you said in your upcoming book WhenThe Game Was Ours.Tell me one of America’s Icons of professional sports didn’t slap his homie Isiah Thomas around tell-all style in a book he co-wrote with Larry Bird. Tell me Ian Thomsen just made all this up.

You have to read the SI.com article to get ‘Zeke’s take on ‘Gic’s book. He didn’t pull any punches in calling ‘Gic out for not saying any of this face to face. For instance, the article includes the following excerpts from the book.

Much of their story involves Thomas, who as captain of the Detroit Pistons served as a primary threat to the championship ambitions of Bird’s Celtics and Magic’s Lakers. The book offers revelations that have stunned Thomas. Magic addresses years of rumors by finally accusing Thomas of questioning his sexuality after Johnson was diagnosed with HIV in 1991. Magic also admits that he joined with Michael Jordan and other players in blackballing Thomas from the 1992 Olympic Dream Team, saying, “Isiah killed his own chances when it came to the Olympics. Nobody on that team wanted to play with him. … Michael didn’t want to play with him. Scottie[Pippen] wanted no part of him. Bird wasn’t pushing for him. Karl Malonedidn’t want him. Who was saying, ‘We need this guy?’ Nobody.”

“I’m glad that he’s finally had the nerve and the courage to stand up and say it was him, as opposed to letting Michael Jordan take the blame for it all these years,” Thomas responded during one of several interviews he gave to SI.com on Wednesday. “I wish he would have had the courage to say this stuff to me face to face, as opposed to writing it in some damn book to sell and he can make money off it.”